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An anonymous reader writes with an update to an earlier story about a group wanting to destroy your violent video games. "Southington, a town in Connecticut, has canceled its plans to collect and destroy violent games, stating that it has already succeeded in raising attention."
Perhaps the real reason: "Backed by the Southington Chamber of Commerce, SouthingtonSOS originally planned to offer citizens $25 gift certificates in exchange for their violent games, films, and CDs, which the group would collect for 'permanent disposal.'"

I'm currently pissed at the NRA for pointing the finger at violent media, though they had a point if they'd restricted it to the *news*. Specifically, the making of the shooter into a celebrity, the digging into their life, etc...

I also happen to think our support structure for the mentally ill is horribly broken and needs to be fixed. End the war on drugs, actually combat poverty, treat the sick and we'd be more like Switzerland - awash with guns, but very little crime, not just 'little gun crime'.

I am a gun owner, but I would never join the NRA, and I am disgusted that they are so often considered to represent all gun owners. They have taken positions on drug prohibition, censorship, "precrime", and other issues that are appalling. They may be pro-gun, but they are certainly not pro-freedom. I believe in the 2nd amendment, but I believe in the rest of our constitution as well.

Exactly. It is like saying the RIAA represents the artists. The RIAA represents the labels, not the artists. Are their times when the labels' goals and the artists' goals coincide? Sure. But in the end the RIAA is looking out for the labels, not the artists.

Similarly, the NRA is looking out for the gun manufacturers. What do the gun manufacturers want? More sales! So they'll be opposed to banning any kind of weapon or bullet no matter how ridiculous it would be for a civilian to own one. They'd als

You might also be pissed at the NRA for polarizing the issue so badly. By refusing to compromise on anything at all, they really invite criticism. I'm a liberal. I really don't want to take away your guns. Hearing them constantly bleat that I'm out to get them makes their side look bad. Were I less logical, I might question the sanity of that whole side of the debate.

Fortunately, I am more logical than that. Unfortunately, many people are not, and many liberals I've talked to are, if anything, driven to be anti-gun because of how ferocious the NRA is.

By refusing to compromise on anything at all, they really invite criticism. I'm a liberal. I really don't want to take away your guns.

You seem to make the mistake that anything up to but not including outright confiscation is A-OK. You see it time and time again on the mainstream media, they're proposing registration, bans on production, bans on transfer, extra taxes, etc. Under many of the laws the next generation won't even ever have the guns we have in the first place making taking them away impossible, but as long as it's not outright confiscation they slyly say "We're not trying to take your guns away." as if you're acting paranoid.

The 2nd amendment says "Shall not be infringed.", not "Your guns shall not be taken away.".

Tanks are arms. A10 gunships are arms. Chemical and biological weapons are arms. Nuclear weapons are arms. No one seriously disputes the fact that we get to infringe on bearing arms, the question is only where to draw the line. Why do you insist that semi-automatic weapons must not be infringed but not tanks and nukes?

Why do you insist that semi-automatic weapons must not be infringed but not tanks and nukes?

In the general case, the "militia" is a source of infantry. The basic weapon of the infantry is the rifle. A self-loading (the proper term for what is colloquially call "semi-automatic") rifle is a perfectly adequate infantry weapon (automatic fire for anything other than suppressive fire is vastly overrated).

On the other hand, very few infantry have ever used tanks or nukes as their primary weapons - largely be

By refusing to compromise on anything at all, they really invite criticism.

How exactly do you compromise with people being driven entirely by fear and anger? That's what every gun control debate erupts from: Someone gets a case of the stupids, and people are all like "It's a tragedy! Someone must be made responsible for this!" And then off we go on a whirlwind adventure of accusations, witch hunting, and finger pointing, and the end result is some horrific soul-crushing attack on our civil liberties.

Maybe the NRA is simply tired of having to respond to these mindless lemmings chan

Which some people seem to think is okay. Yet one reason this right exists is to allow us to protect ourselves from our government. And as our government has no limits on their available firepower, I resent any limitations on what I can have. This applies perpetually. If phasers get invented, the government will have them so I better be able to have them. Otherwise I will be unable to defend myself from the government and eventually that is something they will use against me.

I hear this a lot, and I have all my life, but I still don't know that it's true. The actual text, and the background of how the second amendment was introduced and implemented, it doesn't appear like this is the case.

Minute-men had a huge impact and militias were 100% vital in the USA coming into existence, but the second amendment was written to keep the USA in existence. They wanted a well-regulated milita (a well-trained, armed force) to be able to bear arms to protect the security of a free State (essentially, the ability to train, and be called on, to protect the USA.)

I'm not against the idea that a little rebellion now and again is good for a state, but it doesn't seem to be historically accurate to connect it to the second amendment

I believe early on it was used to justify telling gun manufacturers they had to create weapons of certain sizes and required men of a certain age to own a gun and other equipment, and was sometimes used to justify drafts before we had a true organized national military.

Also interesting that you would consider yourself and the government as two very separate entities. And the idea that, if the government has a weapon you don't, then they will use it against you. I believe our founding father's believed, above all else in government, that this government would be of the people and that the structure setup would ensure that it would stay that way.

I'm currently pissed at the NRA for pointing the finger at violent media

I don't know, they might have a point. I'm in my 30s, I've been playing games for many years now, all kinds of games. It turns out a lot of them are violent. I'm not a violent person by nature, but I admit that after spending several hours playing Far Cry 3, now I really want to go hang gliding.

violence everywhere in movies and tv. sports, too. we glorify it. we 'honor' war heros. we encourage unrestricted capitalism. we like 'winner takes all'. we like it when we have to compete fiercely just to survive.

there is no simple fix to this. its not about 'mental patients'. it runs way deeper, into our very culture and what makes us think we are 'leading the world' in this or that.

I'm for gun rights but it's pointless to cite these stories because you're 22 TIMES more likely to use a gun against someone you know. Throwing more guns into the mix will definitely stop crimes, but you're going to create FAR more inicidents than you stop.

You are significantly more likely to harm/kill someone you know, full stop.

That's simply because, there's usually a trigger event, and that will usually involve people, and you deal more regularly, and have more time to build up animosity (to the tipping point) with people you know.

The only thing that statistic is useful logic for, is preventing anyone from knowing anyone else.

Murders are committed about twice as often by unarmed people (e.g. strangulation, kicking, punching) as they are with rifles. Murders are committed with blunt objects (hammers, clubs) about 20% more than they are with rifles. Automobile fatalities occur at a rate of three times that of firearms homicides.

The "you're more likely to kill x with a gun" arguments always fall on their face when you take a closer look.

For example, a woman using her weapon against an abusive boyfriend is far more likely to happen than her using it against a robber, mainly because a robber is less likely to attack her than her boyfriend (the robber prefers to wait until nobody is home.) There, she used it against somebody she knew. But is there anything wrong with it? Absolutely not, that scenario goes in FAVOR of owning firearms, but the gun control lobby instead lumps it into a statistic going against owning them.

This would also apply to e.g. a relative or neighbor attempting to abduct one of your kids. Your neighbor is somebody you know. Women and kids are far more likely to be sexually assaulted by somebody they know than a complete stranger. Your house is far more likely to be burglarized by somebody you know than a complete stranger.

Have you ever wondered why that statistic you throw around doesn't say anything about justifiable homicide? It's because the gun control lobby wants people to blindly follow them. Take ALL statistics with a grain of salt because they almost never tell the entire story, they're often thrown out with the sole purpose of persuasion, and therefore are inherently biased.

Even the above statistics I threw up above are biased, because they only include rifles (but to be fair, rifles are what the politicians are trying to ban.)

Even the above statistics I threw up above are biased, because they only include rifles

Excluding handguns from a discussion about gun control is about as biased as you can get.

The rifle/school shooting issue is really a red herring, the elephant in the room is the enormous number of semi-automatic handguns in the US. If you're shooting people from relatively close range (in somewhere like a classroom) there isn't that much difference in effectiveness between a rifle and a handgun.

So when fascist dictatorships disarm the entire population, and then mass execute people, are you saying that guns would not have prevented that?

Yep. You're presenting a hypothetical that has actually been tested, and found to fail miserably. Libya, Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and pretty much every cvilian vs government conflict of the past 100 years hinged on air superiority. If you had air superiority, you did well. If you didn't, all the AK-47s and RPGs in the world didn't help you.

Would lack of gun ownership make any difference in these cases?

Possible, though hard to tell, as these are anecdotes, and not scientific experiments. It's impossible to tell how those events would have unfolded without guns at the re

An assault rifle by definition has selectable fire, e.g. the ability to go fully automatic. And are already illegal (except for the government and certain gun manufacturers). The federal permit is required to own guns with barrels shorter than 16" that are not a handguns.
What the recent proposed legislation wants to ban is things that merely look like assault rifles as the OP said.

Despite the many gun owners and lobbying (bribing) NRA group, self-defense hasn't prevented a single massacre

Well first of all, it's not a massacre if it's been stopped.Second, it's illegal for me as a gun owner to carry a gun on school property, so you've artificially limited the data set.Third, I don't have enough people in my home to qualify as a "massacre" even if someone killed everybody in the building.Fourth, you should probably educate yourself on exactly what an "assault rifle" and an "assault weapon" really are, how they are legally defined, and notice that most people use the terms to mean the same thin

Without splitting the world into two, and seeing how many people would have been killed on the timeline where the armed/out-of-control gunman were allowed to gun down every one he or she wanted, then we can't say for certain, no.

Our friends at tautology club can tell us that self defense shootings failed to prevent every massacre that actually happened...

I was arguing against the person who said guns never prevented a mass murder, and was pointing out how silly his logic was, through a bit of sarcasm. Chill spaz master. Take your medicine if you've missed a dose and/or stop taking the other people's medicine that wasn't prescribed to you.

They do make it easier for a mass killing like this, but they can also reduce the number of smaller scale incidents. I don't think there's a right or a wrong answer to this one, only "which set of problems are you happier with?"

Actually, it has prevented many. But usually they are dismissed. For example, off duty cop, or in the case of the "security guard" at the church. Who was merely a citizen who had a carry permit, and due to some concerns had volunteered at the church. (Essentially, what I used to do.)

No, there are many cases. But you'll almost never hear them in the news, cause they do not fit the agenda.

That, and the perpetrator is usually taken out before it can become a "massacre".

...except for the recent shooting in Oregon, where the shooter turned his gun on himself after a civilian with concealed carry pointed his gun at the shooter. (and chose not to shoot due to people behind the shooter)
Funny the news never reported it that way.

its the factor of somebody with "Iron" reminding a Whacko that "If You Touch Iron Im going to be faster" im sure that every responsible CCW holder can go into the OODA loop in about 3 seconds (assumes they are not always in a soft OODA loop).

Despite the many gun owners and lobbying (bribing) NRA group, self-defense hasn't prevented a single massacre. How about you stop using "self-defense" as the reason gun nuts want assault rifles?

Considering the fact that such massacres always occur in so called gun-free zones exactly how are firearms to prevent something when they are actively prohibited from being present? The people who would actually use them in self-defense obey the law and the murderers do not. In fact, they count on the law abiding doing just that.

You also fail to observe that no gun ban has prevented a massacre either. Evil people do evil things. How about we start figuring out why these people get to that point and address

Self-defense hasn't prevented a massacre because in all of the mass-shootings in the US save for one, they took place in "gun-free zones" where citizens were prevented from carrying their legally-owned firearms to use in self-defense. You can't use your gun to defend yourself if they tell you you're not allowed to carry it. Imagine that, all of these massacres happen where the perpetrator knows it's going to be fish in a barrel.

If you wanted to shoot up a place, which one would you choose: the one where peo

Despite the many gun owners and lobbying (bribing) NRA group, self-defense hasn't prevented a single massacre

But it has prevented ~300,000 individual massacres, rapes, robberies, etc. Per year. That's based on various poll-based research efforts into defensive gun use. (The noteworthy studies seem to range from 80k to 2.6 million, but ~300k or so seemed most credible to me when I was doing some light research into the issue.)

On top of the known cases (which, admittedly, we don't know exactly how they would have turned out in the absence of a firearm), the implicit threat of firearm availability has probably saved many more lives, such as women who fear their violent exes or homeowners in crime-prone areas. And of course, the implicit threat of protracted civil revolt is a deterrent to cases of outright tyranny (i.e., Nazi Germany, communist China, Soviet Russia) that have a habit of killing millions, not just twenty.

Bullshit http://youtu.be/Mm9o3vhKoF8 [youtu.be]
And in Israel a school shooting was stopped by an armed student that killed the gunman. How about you stop being a fucking idiot and learn some factual information?

How do you know? Do you have a parallel universe machine that lets you see what would have happened in all the cases in which someone did use a gun in self defense if they had not done so?

Ten seconds of looking gives me:http://www.ktvn.com/Global/story.asp?S=8378732&nav=menu549_2 [ktvn.com]
- man starts shooting in a bar containing 300 people. 2 people die before he is shot by a civilian. Somehow you know that even though he was reloading when he was shot he wasn't going kill enough more people for you to call it a massacre?

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/12/10/colorado.shootings/index.html [cnn.com]
- man has already killed 4 and is shot by a a lady who was volunteering as security at her church (so not quite a random bystander, but still a civilian carrying their private weapon). You know he wasn't going to kill anyone else, he brought 1000 rounds of ammunition for no reason at all.

People think they'll do this, but in real situations casual gun-owners tend to panic.

Yeah, it's impossible to secure a gun against your kid.

It's quite possible, it just doesn't happen.

What difference does it make if people tell themselves they'll be responsible, sober, and competent, when they routinely fail in the event? In a city or suburb, there's no evidence whatsoever they're statistically effective for the defense of a home or person by a even a trained civ

The zombies I don't mind, those are funny, and just generally people being silly. Black shilloutes (lines) are also fine. But there are actual targets of people too, or that look so much like a person, that you would be able to tell unless you looked at just the right spot, right up close.

the movie killer in Colorado rigged his apartment with explosives and they were only not set off because he told the cops. I would much rather focus resources on solutions that prevent all kinds of spree killing attacks, but go ahead and ignore the root problem, the mentally ill are not getting help when they cry out for it.

I'll grant you, many people who promote gun control don't have a clue about guns, then again, many who are strongly against it, seem to be in the same line. I'd also argue that many who promote gun control overestimate what the authorities can do to protect them.

However, that doesn't really change that they aren't demonizing these people. They are making ownership of certain types of firearms harder.

At the same point, as the number of rounds your firing in a given timeframe goes up, the less likely you are

Part of the problem is the idiotic definition of anything over 10 as "high". Virtually every duty-sized 9mm sold today comes with a 17 to 18 round magazine. The only ones that come with smaller ones are handguns that are sold in larger calibers so as to do more damage, or handguns that are made physically smaller so as to be easier to conceal.

Though I don't agree with ANY caps on magazine capacity, they'd probably meet a lot less resistance if the definition of high was a little more sane (ie, 20). Calli

They made the mistake of giving out beta access to that game with a $5 preorder, so I got away without buying it. I'd still rank that among the worst $5 I've ever spent, and I've bought Powerball tickets.

Funny thing is PETA will tell the mediots where and when they will be picketing. So, after the media packs up and leaves, PETA hangs up the signs and go's home. They do not picket for a full day. They picket for the hour or two the news cameras are pointed at them.

Raise awareness of what, exactly? Violent videogames? That seems... odd, unless you are working for a marketing department. The dangers of violent video games? What dangers? I've seen exactly zero evidence of any such dangers (TFA says there is "ample evidence" but, of course, they don't actually cite what that evidence is, exactly). The only awareness that seems to have been raised is that the group behind this are a bunch of scared people lashing out at what they don't understand, desperately looking for something to blame. They said they wanted to "prompt discussions", but you can't have meaningful discussions without some evidence about how or even if video games have negative effects, and there is no such evidence.

I can't really take issue with the program as they would have implemented it. It's a voluntary program, the person with the game is reimbursed for the game, and the game is destroyed. It's stated up front, everybody knows what the endgame is. At the end of the day, it sounds just like a sponsored gun buyback program. I wouldn't take my games personally, but at the end of the day it's a good potential resource for concerned parents out there. If the NRA is willing to sponsor a program like this one, I fail to see why they'd be protesting a gun buyback program in Tucson (http://www.npr.org/2013/01/09/168926749/nra-vows-to-stop-tuscon-from-destroying-guns).

I can't really take issue with the program as they would have implemented it.

But you should take issue with it, because it is anti-science, and it is diverting the public's attention from the real issues. There is NO evidence that violent video games cause real life violence, and there is at least a correlation between video games and lower violence. This may be because teenagers are spending more time at home playing games, and less time on the street, joining gangs and getting in trouble. They would probably be doing more good if they handed out games rather than collecting them. If they are allowed to do this without protest, people will assume that their pseudo-science is actually legitimate.

I agree with the points you make about video games, their 'effect' on violence and their use as scapegoats. However, the program IS (well, would have been) voluntary and could potentially serve as a resource for parents of younger children who don't, for some reason or another, feel comfortable with their (non teenage) kids playing violent stuff. I'm simply trying to point out the hypocrisy of the NRA calling for a program like this one while lambasting voluntary gun buyback programs. I find it hilarious

If the NRA is willing to sponsor a program like this one, I fail to see why they'd be protesting a gun buyback program in Tucson

The NRA doesn't sponsor video buybacks either. If they did, they'd be stupid. If someone did this trick in my neck of the woods, I'd do exactly what other posters suggested:* Go to WalMart, GameStop, etc. and clean the $5 bin out.* Get my $25 gift certificate for each.* Repeat.

All they wanted in life was attention. They got it. Now they shut the fuck up. Overall, a happy ending... although it would be better if they would get their heads out of their asses and realize what the real problem is: mentally deranged psychopaths who are beyond fucked in the head. Not otherwise inanimate objects such as plastic discs, or even guns on their own without a lunatic wielding them.

Okay, here's a simple one for the editors to fix:
Connecticut is the correct spelling, not Conneticut.http://www.ct.gov/ [ct.gov] -- official Connecticut state government portal.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut [wikipedia.org] -- wikipedia link.
Let's see how long it takes to fix it or continue to ignore it. It's 9:45 am PST now. Start counting.

Had a great conversation with my parents over break about the access little kids have to games like Grand Theft Auto. My 6 and 7 year-old nephews said THEY had played! Parents just don't seem to understand that "video game" doesn't mean Pacman and Asteroids anymore.

Additionally, it would seriously help out with the maturity level on multiplayer maps.

Took my son to a friend of his 8 year old bday party. I forget the game xbox game, but from the title I just shook my head and low and behold it had an 'M' rating on it. I could see the mother looking at it and thinking of where she was going to hide it as their was no way her son was going to play it. Some parents are just clueless as to age appropriate. I'll stick with Forza Horizon and Lego Star Wars with my son.

Any campaign to buy back violent games and, especially, movies would be a drop in the ocean.

After I heard about the Newtown shooting, I decided to spend the evening avoiding violence in all media. That meant turning off the news, of course, and looking around for what to do.

What struck me was the shortage of non-violent entertainment in my house. With the exception of baseball, all my Xbox games are violent to some degree. All the DVDs on my shelf had some level of violence -- even the Disney movies and nature documentaries (I can't stand chick flicks, but lots of those are nonviolent). There's violence in TV commercials. I ended up watching some episodes of Through the Wormhole on my DVR.

If you like violent games and movies, I have no problem with that. But since that day, I've been quite amazed by the pervasiveness of violence in games, movies, and TV.

"Don't get me wrong, I am fully aware you are trying to do what you think is best," said Ferguson "but there is real risk in focusing people's attention on the wrong thing, as well as contributing to historical patterns of 'moral panic' that tend to surround new media.

"I'm very appreciative of the sincerity of your group, but at the same time I've been concerned about some of your public statements linking video games to bullying and youth aggression which do not accurately reflect the science," Ferguson continued. "As a scientist, when we see that someone is saying something that isn't scientifically true, ethically we're supposed to take some time to try and speak with them and point that out to them...I've done a number of peer-reviewed articles myself on the topic, and have found no evidence linking video game violence to bullying or any other forms of youth aggression or violence.""

I was kind of hoping that their plans for permanent disposal involved putting all the CDs in a pile and blowing them up with explosives. Or maybe using them for a skeet shoot. They could have sold tickets to that to make up for the gift certificates they were giving out.

That is stereotyping and I don't like it. I'm a young white male. I know other young white males who play very violent video games. They spend their weekends working at a crappy job. Yet, they don't have a single violent tendency.

Calm down. I didn't mean to get mad at you. Generalization is not really great and I'm tired of having to be on the shit list on every government-backed promotion that aims to rid the internet, violent games, and violent media.